Essar Oil has maintained the commissioning date for Phase I of its refinery project at July 2006. Operations are likely to begin at a capacity of 7 million tpa and the ramp up to the name plate capacity of 10.5 million tpa will be done by January 2007.

The refinery would ultimately produce 10.5-12 million tonnes of petroleum products per year, out of which diesel would be 5.5 million tonnes per year, and gasoline (petrol) 2.2 million tonnes per year.

Retail outlets: Essar Oil currently has 700 retail outlets but most of them are not operating due to economic non-viability. In the absence of refining capacity, Essar was operating the outlets by importing petroleum products. By June 2006, Essar Oil plans to have 1,500 retail outlets that would sell products from the Vadinar refinery. The company has targeted to have 5,000 retail outlets by 2008.

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